


Stars Keep Watch in the Night (and So Will I)

by catlike



Category: Batman - All Media Types, Gotham (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Fluff, Future Fic, Pining, Selina can steal from Bruce, but no one else can, cats are territorial like that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-20
Updated: 2019-11-20
Packaged: 2021-02-18 03:07:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,130
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21504190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/catlike/pseuds/catlike
Summary: After ten long years, Wayne Manor is reopened, reoccupied, and refurbished, and the entire Gotham underworld laughs and thanks their lucky stars, because the manor holds as many riches as El Dorado, and it’s owner is nothing but a playboy. But what the thieves don’t know yet is that if they want to get to Bruce Wayne, they’ll have to go through Selina Kyle first.Because this is what Selina does - what she’s always done since she was a kid - she protects Bruce. Even when he doesn’t know it.So Selina keeps robbers at bay and stands guard over the manor, as watchful as one of the gargoyles Bruce has on his gate, and since he’s busy dealing with crimes that are actually being committed rather than with crimes that have already been stopped, she never expects Bruce to find out about what she’s doing.But then he does.- Set after the Gotham finale. -
Relationships: Selina Kyle/Bruce Wayne
Comments: 11
Kudos: 135





	Stars Keep Watch in the Night (and So Will I)

Bruce Wayne, Gotham’s favorite son, is finally back home after being gone who-knows-where, doing who-knows-what for a decade, and Wayne Manor’s become the latest prime target for thieves.

Not that this fact surprises Selina, not with the rumors that have been swirling around the city. There’s whispers of a Van Gogh above Bruce’s bed (true), a Vermeer in his walk-in closet (false), and how selling a single one of Bruce’s suit jackets could fetch you a payday worth four figures ( _disgustingly_ true). And the entire Gotham underworld laughs, because Wayne Manor holds as many riches as El Dorado, and it’s owner is nothing but a playboy.

Rumor has it that a bold thief is planning on breaking in that very night.

Not that Selina has any reason to care. She has a mixed bag of feelings when it comes to Bruce Wayne, most of them angry, some of them sad, and a few she can’t quite explain. But, if she’s being honest, all her best childhood memories are linked to breaking into Wayne Manor, and there’s something that makes her feel unsettled and almost indignant at the thought of anyone else but her breaking in.

It doesn’t make any sense for her to be this protective, Selina tells herself. Bruce is more than capable of taking care of himself. She’s not thirteen anymore and sneaking in to watch him sleep like she’s some sort of self-declared protector of him. She’s no guardian of the manor, ever watchful like one of those gargoyles Bruce has on his gate. It’s not _her_ problem if a thief wants to hit the place.

That’s what she tells herself, and yet she ends up searching for the thief anyways. 

Because this is what she does - what she’s always done since she was a kid - she protects Bruce Wayne. Even when he doesn’t know it.

She finally tracks the thief down to an alleyway behind the hardware store. It’s a guy, a little older than her and a whole lot taller, and she can see he’s holding bright red bolt cutters.

“Hi,” Selina says, as she waves her fingers and the sharp silver tips of her claws glitter dangerously in the dim light. “Got a minute? I’d love to chat.”

The guy takes in the curl of her whip and the gleam of her claws, and she sees his guard go up, as if he’s readying himself for a fight.

“Catwoman?” the guy asks suspiciously, and Selina gets an odd sense of pleasure from the fact that he knows of her. “What do you want?”

“Heard you were planning on breaking into Wayne Manor tonight,” she says.

“Do you have a problem with that?”

The question on its own seems mostly harmless, but there’s pure danger in the way the guy purposefully steps toward her as he asks, and points the sharp tip of his bolt cutters right at her ribcage.

“Actually, I _do_ have a problem with that,” Selina answers, voice tense, eyes on the bolt cutters. “Wayne Manor is _mine_.”

She’s the one speaking, and yet Selina’s still a little surprised at her own words, a little shocked that they came out of her mouth so readily, like her statement was already formed and right on the tip of her tongue, waiting to be said aloud. Wayne Manor’s not hers, she reminds herself. _Bruce Wayne_ is not hers. Not anymore. 

So why does it feel like he is?

She’ll dissect that thought later. Right now the guy is moving closer, bolt cutters out like a weapon, and she knows he’s not bluffing, knows he’d like to teach the girl who dared to tell him _no_ a lesson, so she reaches for her whip. It takes nothing more than a practiced flick of Selina’s wrist for her whip to wind it’s way around the threatening bolt cutters, yank them from out of the guy’s hand, and send them clattering down to the wet pavement.

Eyes wide, the guy stares down in surprise at his hand that now holds nothing but air, and Selina twists her whip again, moving it back and forth like the twitching tail of an angry cat, ready to strike.

“Rule Number One: No one touches Wayne Manor but _me_. Got it?”

The guy swallows, watching as her whip licks the air and cuts through the space between them, and then he glances down at the bolt cutters lying on the ground, as if he’s trying to calculate their distance and how he can still run her through. But then Selina snaps the whip somewhere in the air beside his right ear, and though it never touches him, he jumps.

“Okay, I got it,” the guy says, and she can see him wince at her whip when she readjusts her grip. “The place is all yours, Catwoman.”

Selina smiles.

“Nice chatting with you,” she says, and then in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it pivot, she vanishes back into the night.

And so Selina hears the rumors start amongst the criminal underworld that Wayne Manor is Catwoman’s, and Catwoman’s only. It may look like an easy target, one thief will say to another, but Catwoman’s declared the place off-limits. They’re not scared of Bruce Wayne, but they’re scared of _her_. And the stories say that if you even set foot on the property, _she_ will find out, and _she_ will not be happy.

And so Wayne Manor remains untouched by all except Selina, and since Batman is busy dealing with crimes that are _actually_ being committed rather than with crimes that _aren’t_ , she thinks that Bruce is none the wiser.

And then that all changes.

#

It’s two in the morning, but Selina’s wide awake, her pulse singing with adrenaline in the quiet of the night as she plans her heist.

Bruce has a Degas hanging above his fireplace, a Fabergé egg in the entry, and so many other works of art that are as stunning as they are expensive. But they’re not the reason why Selina’s crouching just outside of Wayne Manor’s garden walls.

No, she’s here for something _priceless_. 

She’s here because she knows Sunday nights are the nights when Alfred makes his famous lemon cake.

It’s stupid, but she misses it. Misses the subtle taste of tart lemon mixed with the drizzle of sweet sugar icing, and the way it all melts on her tongue. She also misses sitting in the warm glow of the manor’s kitchen, next to a boy she trusts, and having him smile softly at her while she laughs.

If Selina’s being honest, she misses that part more than the actual cake, but she can only work on the food part right now.

She doubts she’ll ever see Bruce Wayne smile at her again. She doesn’t even know if _she’ll_ ever want to smile at _him_ again.

But the lemon cake? She can definitely swipe some of that. Slipping in and out of Wayne Manor unnoticed with a few slices of it will be nothing for someone like her.

Decision made, Selina rises, and then leaps up onto the thick stone wall in one fluid motion. Slowly, she stands and then pivots, and her footwork is as graceful as any dancer’s, but her performance is meant for darkness and rooftops, not spotlights and stages.

She calculates the distance downward and readies herself to jump, but someone beats her to it. Out of the corner of her eye, against the dark shadows, Selina sees a silhouette move. She watches - somewhat in shock - as the intruder jumps from the wall, then dashes across the drive and up to one of the dark windows.

The thief must be a rookie, Selina thinks. They hadn’t even been aware of their surroundings enough to notice her, and their footsteps weren’t nearly as soundless as they should be, their movements not as agile. A rookie who’s new in town would also explain why they were stupid enough to try to rob a place that she’s so openly declared is hers.

She raises an eyebrow, curious, as she watches the thief fumble with the window. She waits for them to fail, but instead, much to her surprise, she sees the window actually open, and the thief inelegantly but successfully climb inside.

“ _Unbelievable_ ,” Selina hisses under her breath. 

Though she won’t ever say it out loud, she’s come to think of herself as the unofficial guardian of Wayne Manor, and just because _she_ can rob the place, doesn’t mean anyone else can, so it’s with some ferocity that she leaps from where she stands on the wall and tears across the pavement and toward the open window. Expertly, Selina slips inside, landing on the floor as elegantly and quietly as her alter ego’s feline namesake. The hall is dark, shrouded in shadow, and the only thing to see by is the pale moonlight coming in through the window, but it doesn’t take very long for Selina to spot the thief: he’s against the hall wall, back to her, trying to remove a Monet from where it hangs.

The stupid rookie doesn’t even have _gloves_ on, Selina notes with irritation, and she thinks that she’s never been so disgusted in her life. Not only by this amateur, but by the fact that this amateur actually got _in. Seriously, Bruce?_ she thinks. If this moron got in, imagine how easy it would be for someone with actual _skills_ to get in.

Maybe Bruce _deserved_ to be robbed.

“Idiots,” Selina mutters, as she unfurls her whip and prepares to strike, “both of them.”

The thief looks like he’s just about to bring the Monet down on his head and damage it before he can even successfully steal it, so Selina sighs, twists her wrist outward, and curls her whip around him, yanking him backwards.

“You’re trespassing, Wayne Manor is _my_ territory,” Selina hisses. “You have two options, a smart one and a stupid one: leave quietly by walking out on your own, or leave quietly because I’m dragging your body out.”

At her words, the thief twists, lurching around within the whip violently, reaching for something, and it’s not a second later that Selina sees the silver barrel of a gun pointed at her chest.

She doesn’t find the gun worrisome. She’s taken down men taller and heavier than this one, with bigger guns and smarter plans, but she _is_ irritated. What is it with gun-carrying freaks wanting to shoot her in Wayne Manor?

“I see you’re going with the stupid option,” Selina says, and she rolls her eyes, as unimpressed as she is unsurprised. She jerks her whip hard and fast, and then watches as the inept thief falls, knocking himself unconscious against the hardwood floor. The gun flies from his now-limp hand and goes skittering across the hall, and Selina’s about to fetch it, when she feels a familiar presence and she stills, motionless as one of the expensive statues that line the hall she stands in.

 _He’s_ there. She knows. She’s not sure how. She’d been so distracted by the other intruder, she hadn’t even been consciously reminding herself to watch out for Bruce. But it seems that, as unconscious as it was, she’s still managed to sense him anyways.

Maybe it’s because the thought of him is always right there in the back of her mind, ever constant, like the cadence of her heartbeat.

Bracing herself, Selina turns, and finds herself face to face with Bruce. They stand there - her in the shadows, him in the pale half-light - staring at each other.

Neither moves, and it’s like the moment’s frozen, suspended in time, somewhere in that quiet space between heartbeats and spans of breath.

Since he’s been back, Selina’s seen him in his mask, seen him from a distance, but not up close, not like this. Bruce is so close, she could reach out and touch him with the tip of her claw, but the distance between them somehow feels farther, the chasm between them wider, and so she doesn’t move. There’s so much between them that’s been left unsaid, and she’s not exactly angry at him, but she still hasn’t quite forgiven him either. She doesn’t know what to say, so instead of speaking, Selina studies him.

He’s older now. Taller, broader. He’d always been serious, but somehow he looks even more so. It’s like the look on his face is halfway between solemn and sad, and Selina finds herself searching his eyes, looking for signs of the boy she once knew so long ago. But she doesn’t know what will hurt more: if she finds him, or if she doesn’t, so she stops looking.

“Bruce,” she finally says, finding her voice and breaking the silence. “Your security system’s as lame as always.”

“Selina,” Bruce replies, his voice calm and steady. He doesn’t look surprised to see her for some reason.

“This guy was trying to rob you,” Selina continues, for lack of anything better to say, as she motions vaguely toward the unconscious body on the floor. “Can you believe it?”

Bruce merely raises his eyebrows, “And what exactly were _you_ doing here?”

“That’s different,” Selina says, somewhat defensively. It’s different because it’s _her_ and it’s _him_ and it’s _here_. That’s why she has to protect this place, because as sharp and cynical as she may be, she always protects what’s hers. Doesn’t he know that?

There’s another span of silence, and they keep staring at each other, keep standing in Wayne Manor’s hall, just like they did so many years ago, and it’s simultaneously like everything and nothing between them has changed.

“I’ll call Gordon to come get him,” Bruce finally says, nodding at the body on the floor, and Selina thinks that their stilted conversation has run its course and is coming to a close, but then Bruce looks up at her and says, “So, Wayne Manor is ‘ _your_ territory?’”

Selina blinks, her clawed fingers curling in the dark as she curses herself. She must not have hissed that territory sentence out as quietly as she had thought, and she can tell that Bruce is wearing that look she remembers from when she was young, where he presses his lips together and tries not to look smug and _fails_. 

_Idiot_ , Selina thinks. She’d forgotten how irritating he could be, how easy it was for him to try her patience and get under her skin. That’s one aspect of their relationship that remains unchanged, apparently. She cocks an eyebrow, rests her hand against her hip, and challenges him with, “You got a problem with that, Bruce?”

“No,” he says, slightly shaking his head. “You always were the unofficial lady of the manor anyways.”

He says it so calmly, so casually, as if she knows this, as if it’s a fact he thinks is as obvious as gravity, as if he has no idea that his words are taking her by surprise and making something in her chest ache for the years before.

And then Bruce turns away from her, and Selina thinks that he’s going to disappear again. He’ll go back to his study, and she’ll slip out into the night, and they’ll go back to being ghosts of each other’s past, just a bittersweet, broken mess of _almosts_ and _used to be’s_. But then Bruce turns to look back over his shoulder at her.

”Come into the kitchen while you’re here,” he says, the invitation issued in that formal manner of his, as if it’s not two in the morning and she hasn’t just broken in uninvited. “It’s Sunday. Alfred made lemon cake.”

“I know,” Selina says, rolling her eyes. She’s somehow offended that he thinks she’s forgotten. “It’s _Sunday_. It’s _tradition_.”

And then something happens that Selina doesn’t expect: Bruce smiles.

Selina hasn’t seen Bruce Wayne smile in ten long years.

She never thought she’d see him smile at _her_ again.

It’s not a big smile. It’s small and barely there, just the slightest upward turn at the corners of his mouth. It wouldn’t even be noticeable if you didn’t know him, but Selina _does_ , and she knows it’s genuine.

It’s stupid that something so small can stop her in her tracks, can almost leave her breathless. But it does, and she can feel her pulse race just a little bit faster, can feel that pull he has toward her again. Bruce once stood there and told her that he felt tied together with her in a way he wouldn’t want to ever change, and she thought that maybe it _had_ changed. But there’s something about the way he’s staring at her that tells Selina that it hasn’t.

“You remembered the schedule,” Bruce says.

He doesn’t need to fill in the blanks. Doesn’t need to say out loud that it’s been a decade and she still hasn’t forgotten. They’re both thinking it.

Selina rolls her eyes.

“Sure,” she says, shrugging her shoulders and trying to sound like she couldn’t care less, like the memories of Sunday’s at Wayne Manor aren’t ones that she replays in her head on lonely weekend nights as she falls asleep alone. It takes all of Selina’s self-control to keep her face an unreadable mask and pretend that the cake isn’t the very reason why she came and that them in the hall and her breaking in isn’t making her mind spin from déjà vu.

“I don’t forget good free food,” Selina tells him. The best liars always tell the truth, after all, even if it’s only part of it. “So, yeah, I remember. Besides, the lemon cake always was my favorite.”

“Yeah,” Bruce says, repeating her words, “I remember.”

Ten years. Ten years since she’s stood in his home, ten years since they’ve spoken this much. And yet he still remembers which one of Alfred’s desserts is her favorite.

She wonders if memories of Sunday’s at Wayne Manor when they were together ever run through his mind too.

“Whatever,” Selina says dismissively, making sure to sound as indifferent as possible. Admitting to having feelings is definitely not her thing, and just because she feels the fluttering melody of her heartbeat beating out a rhythm against her ribcage like it did when she was eighteen doesn’t mean that _he_ needs to know that. She’s got a reputation to keep, after all. “Are we reminiscing or cutting cake?”

Bruce nods, looking satisfied with her reply, and then he opens the door that leads to the kitchen, letting a warm glow spill through the doorway and into the dark hall. And behind his back, where she knows he won’t see, Selina ducks her head and her mask falls, and she smiles.

Because, for better or for worse, she’s the guardian of Wayne Manor.

And she’s finally home where she belongs.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on my tumblr (username:selinaakyle).


End file.
